Propaganda & the American Revolution by Cam Addis

1. Quill and Musket Lecturer Series Propaganda & the American Revolutionby Cam Addis

2. Propaganda campaigns, or the competition for what John Adams called "minds and hearts," are crucial in civil struggles like the American Revolution. The British appealed to traditional loyalties and the merits of remaining in their empire. Rebels had to justify their reasons for abandoning those loyalties while stirring up and maintaining resistance. Love of the mother country and king had to be transformed into love of the United States as a tax revolt evolved into full-blown rebellion. Two other factors made propaganda decisive to the war's outcome. First, during the taxation controversies of the mid-1760s, Rebels effectively transformed dry constitutional debates into slogans, pictures and rallying cries. During the relatively quiet period of 1768 to 1773 these symbols sustained a victimized frame of mind, nourishing the idea of a British conspiracy aimed at usurping the colonists' freedoms. Second, after 1775 the Rebels' home-field advantage and the English public's apathy canceled out the Redcoats' numerical superiority, so each side strove to enlist the aid of interested third parties: Indians, slaves, Canadians, mercenaries and Europeans. The Rebels outfoxed the British and Loyalists in clarifying their message and neutralizing or garnering support from outside groups. Franklin’s Famous Cartoon From French & Indian War Educational Use Only

3. Adams wrote that the colonists' "minds and hearts" were changed "before the War commenced," between 1763 and 1775. Easiest to overlook, Rebels adopted the word patriot for what became a treasonous cause. The term seemingly applied better to Loyalists, but its natural adoption underscored the shift in mentality that Adams described, as did the unifying term American. Patriots aligned themselves with British radicals, though, and signed their writings with Classical pseudonyms, legitimizing their claims within a familiar historical context. They identified with English Whig John Wilkes, for instance, whose defamation of the king in Point #45 of North Britain got him jailed and kicked out of Parliament. In Wilkes' honor Patriots hung 45 lanterns on Liberty Trees, raised banners 45 high, made 45 toasts, and even consumed 45 pounds of beef from a 45 month-old bullock. The British found themselves in the more difficult position of defending imperialism, and never effectively countered the underdog Rebels' manipulation of language, history and symbols. Educational Use Only

4. Patriot symbols translated readily into pamphlets, illustrated broadsides, and bar songs. Children learned jingles that emphasized Whig virtue and Tory evil. Religious symbolism connected the self-determination inherent in democratic rule to the Protestant Reformation, which challenged the supposed divine right of monarchy. Adams and Thomas Jefferson commented that the ministry swayed sentiment against England, while Loyalists asked why Americans were hypocritically colluding with France, the "enemy of Protestantism." Beginning with the 1764 Sugar Act, Patriotic newspapers and pamphleteers galvanized and disseminated this political and religious propaganda, while mobs intimidated Loyalist writers. Benjamin Franklin noted that the press could present truths in "different lights" and "strike while the iron is hot," but also "heat it continually by striking.” Public participation sent the message that it was not only merchants who suffered from taxation. Using traditional rituals reinforced the idea that rebels weren’t making radical desires, only asking for the rights due all Englishmen. Educational Use Only

5. The most effective anti-tax pamphlet was lawyer John Dickinson's Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies, which appeared in the Pennsylvania Chronicle in opposition to the 1767 Townshend Duties. The colonists argued that taxation without consent was unconstitutional, knowing full well their small population would translate into little power if they had been awarded proportional representation. Dickinson's title cleverly drew attention to working-class grievances in a debate argued mainly by, and for the benefit of, merchants and lawyers. Boston elites were especially adept at mobilizing street mobs. Their behavior aggravated the British, whose reciprocating occupations and retaliations only fueled rebel fires. Paul Revere, a member of Sam Adams' Sons of Liberty, painted the 1765 Stamp Act as a dragon, and A Warm Place-Hell (1768) that awaited the Loyalist legislators who voted to rescind the Circular Letter (a call for colonial-wide protest against the Townshend Duties). The satire above (on p139 of your textbook), is a British take on the tarring and feathering of customs commissioner John Malcom during the Tea controversy of 1773; it underscores the street-mob aspect of the American rebellion Educational Use Only

6. In 1770 Redcoats (bloodybacks or lobsters) shot into an unruly mob as they were being pummeled by snowballs. The event was christened the Boston Massacre and immortalized in a Revere painting and poem so melodramatic that trial jurors had to be warned against "wings of fancy." The massacre was strategically honored by rituals of poetry and mourning. Educational Use Only

7. The anniversary of the Stamp Act's 1766 repeal was more celebratory, including booming cannons, chiming bells and parades. Though the 1773 Tea Party was initially discredited outside Boston as juvenile vandalism, the subsequent British crackdown on Massachusetts -- the Coercive (or Intolerable) Acts of 1774 -- enabled Bostonians to forge ties with sympathetic Southern and Middle colonists, leading to the 1st Continental Congress. The Intolerable Acts were resisted with fasts, a pseudo-religious practice first employed to sanctify boycotts against the Townshend Duties. Educational Use Only

8. Maypole Protesting King George III’s Rule Educational Use Only

9. By the mid-1770s, sloganeering aimed at restoring pre-1763 economic rights was redirected toward the broader ambition of independence. James Otis', Patrick Henry's and Dickinson's "No Taxation without Representation" gave way to Henry's "Give me Liberty or Give me Death." In early 1776 Englishman Thomas Paine's Common Sense spelled out the logic of independence in straightforward prose, and challenged the loyalty subjects felt toward their king. Combining the religious and secular, Paine pointed out that Old Testament Jews rejected monarchy, implying a similar route for God's new "chosen people.” Marylander James Chalmers answered Paine in kind with Plain Truth. The Loyalist criticized Paine, Wilkes and their followers, emphasizing the lack of successful democratic precedents and arguing that independence would disrupt Atlantic trade. But Paine's arguments carried the day over Chalmers'. In July, 1776 the most famous propaganda tract of the war -- Jefferson's Declaration of Independence -- explained the Rebel cause to the world (especially potential ally France), and personalized the Parliamentary legalities by blaming King George III for tyrannical infringements. The Declaration was a culmination of Jefferson's earlier tracts, and similar pronouncements and constitutional preambles written elsewhere. The colonists had enjoyed relative freedom and low taxation (or “benign neglect”) under British rule prior to the French and Indian War, so Jefferson's excessive use of tyranny, oppression and slavery, contrasted with liberty and freedom, underscored the rollback of rights colonists experienced between 1763 and 1775. Conscious of Jefferson's hypocrisy, Virginia Governor John [Earl of] Dunmore offered slaves freedom in exchange for joining the Loyalists, but his proclamation, and those of other “negro thieves” like Sir Henry Clinton, further infuriated the colonists. Patriot organs like the Boston Gazette stressed the Rebels' enslavement to Britain while actively censoring black writers who merged abolitionist and revolutionary causes. Educational Use Only

10. Patrick Henry Thomas Paine Educational Use Only

11. The sloganeering of tax revolts and independence carried over into the war. After Continental Congress unified the rebellion in 1776, they became the formal propaganda vehicle. As early military losses mounted, patriotic fervor was critical to maintaining political support and recruiting soldiers who were hesitant to die or leave their family or farms. During the retreat from Manhattan in 1776, captured spy Nathan Hale famously exclaimed on the gallows that he "regretted he had but one life to give to his country." Paine's American Crisis, with its reference to the "times that try men's souls," turned the early New York defeats into an inspirational call-to-arms. Cued by drum-roll, the passage was read to Washington's troops before the Battle of Trenton. Educational Use Only

12. Each side employed accepted modes of treachery and deceit, including kidnappings, bribery and misinformation. Since Washington himself was a powerful propaganda symbol, the British desired his capture and he, in turn, plotted kidnappings and poisonings of British high command. Redcoats prepared special silver handcuffs for Jefferson, a primary symbol of independence, but twice failed to snatch him. Rebels used Benedict Arnold's defection as motivation to defeat the British troops he fought with, and enable Washington to "make a public example out of him." Each side spread rumors of smallpox and plagues in opposing armies. The British forged a document stating that Rebel soldiers would be forced to serve beyond their appointed times and published it in the Loyalist Philadelphia Evening Post. Propagandist tradition calls for exaggerating numbers in victory, and opponents' atrocities in defeat. Washington instructed Congress to embellish figures, and Redcoats were reported “raping the fairer sex from the age of ten to seventy . . . sometimes by five or more brutes." Like other wars, the lootings, desecrations and rape were commonplace enough that it was hard to separate fact from fiction. Supposedly, though, atrocities were not perpetuated by the British on prisoners-of-war, as recruits were assured they would be treated humanely if captured. Educational Use Only

13. The thirty-thousand Hessian mercenaries employed by the British were subjected to propaganda of a different sort when they became prisoners. Hessians captured at Trenton and Saratoga were sent out on work-release among Pennsylvania's German population as farmers, lumberjacks and musicians. Washington knew the region's soil, religious tolerance and mild government were attractive, and many POW's fell in love with women and defected after being offered land and livestock. German-Americans disguised similar offers as tobacco pouches and smuggled them into active troops (the higher the rank, the higher the reward). Jefferson entertained captured Hessian officers at Monticello, hoping to entice them to spread American doctrine. Bribery leaflets were also wrapped around bullets at Bunker Hill and tossed to the Royal Irish Regiment. Sir William Howe enticed over a thousand Rebels to "gain over" with bribes, but Patriot deserters usually had better alternatives than joining the Redcoats. Educational Use Only

14. Overseas, the "blood money" King George offered the Prince of Hesse for mercenaries provided diplomatic propaganda. Many Europeans envied or detested British imperialism, and the American ambassador to France, Benjamin Franklin, made sure the intercepted Hessian letters were translated and published in Belgium and Holland. Even before Franklin's arrival, the French had published Paine and Jefferson. Chalmers had argued that the French and Spanish would unite with England to crush American independence, but Franklin exploited French jealousy of England and their resentment over defeat in the Seven Years’ War to solicit covert aid. Like Washington on a horse, Franklin in coonskin cap was human propaganda, playing to the Paris intelligentsia's infatuation with the “frontier philosopher.” When news of the Saratoga victory reached Paris in 1777, the United States secured military and commercial alliances with France that brought about eventual victory. Franklin also made overtures to rebels in Ireland that forced moderate concessions from the British, though it was implausible for the Americans to offer serious assistance there beyond John Paul Jones' popular sea raids. Half a century after his death, Jones was said to have proclaimed “I have not yet begun to fight” during a naval battle with the British off the coast of Ireland. Educational Use Only

15. French Canadians' roles were likewise important. The Rebels wanted to prevent Quebec from being used as a staging area for British operations, and consequently sought a formal alliance. From one side of their mouths colonists complained about English-sanctioned Catholicism in Quebec, but letters to Quebecers argued that Swiss Cantons proved the viability of Protestant-Catholic co-habitation. When their offers of 1774 and 1775 were rejected, the Americans tried unsuccessfully to seize Canada. Even after the French joined the war, the Canadians maintained neutrality. The British attained some alliances with interior Indians, such as the Iroquois, because of their established connections. The best Rebels could hope for from Indians was neutrality, so they made threats to stave off the sort of frontier attacks that plagued them during the French and Indian war. Governor Jefferson relayed a message to the Shawnee that, if they did not stay neutral, Virginia "would never cease waging war with them while one was to be found on the face of the earth." Subtler diplomacy was conducted in the Ohio Country, where each side sought Indian allies by proving its military worth. The English took Indians to Quebec to show them their fleet; George Rogers Clark's exploits in Illinois were demonstrations of Patriot strength partly intended for Indian eyes. Congress signed a formal agreement with the Delaware in 1778 that formally denied the British claim that Americans would someday threaten their autonomy. Overall, the threat of British-backed Indian attacks, like their proposals for freeing and using slaves, backfired, encouraging some Loyalists to join the Rebel cause. Educational Use Only

16. Bibliography & Sources • Content • Cameron Addis, “Propaganda,” Encyclopedia of the American Revolutionary War: A Political, Social & Military History. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006 • Images • Slide 1: www.thenagain.info/WebChron/USA/BostonMassacre1.jpgSlide 2: newdeal.feri.org/classrm/images/snake.gifSlide 2: www.picturehistory.com/images/products/0/1/0/prod_1022.jpgSlide 3: www.history.org/Foundation/journal/Summer03/images/Aquafortis_w.jpgSlide 4: slavetrade.parliament.uk/slavetrade/image?imageid=89&height=369Slide 5: www.stockton.edu/~gilmorew/0colhis/neng59.jpgSlide 6: seasonsofdiscontent.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/350px-boston_massacre.jpgSlide 6: www.earlyamerica.com/review/winter96/massacre/MassObit.jpgSlide 7: www.earlyamerica.com/review/2005_winter_spring/images/Bostonteasmall.jpgSlide 10: project810.files.wordpress.com/2008/01/patrick_henry.jpgSlide 10: quotationsbook.com/assets/shared/img/5525/460px-Thomas_Paine.jpgSlide 11: sahallquist.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/hale.jpgSlide 12: thebsreport.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/portrait_of_george_washington1.jpgSlide 13: www.bobhudson.com/zeth/hessen3.gifSlide14: www.senate.gov/artandhistory/art/resources/graphic/xlarge/31_00012.jpg Educational Use Only